McFeatters: There is one way to get out of this mess

Sunday

May 12, 2019 at 2:08 PM

By Ann McFeattersTribune News Service

Wow! As if we didn’t know before, we now have irrefutable evidence that not only is Donald Trump a liar (10,000 misstatements of fact while in office), has no memory (he said he couldn’t remember anything he was asked about his contacts with Russia) and, now, it turns out he’s one of the worst business people in the history of the world.

And four out of 10 of Americans say they love him! We do seem to like our con artists, self-promoters and scofflaws.

But the fact that Trump lost “two cents out of every business dollar lost in the entire United States” from 1984 to 1995 (over $1 billion) does prove his promise that he would treat the U.S. treasury as he would his own money. He’s a terrible businessman.

Add $2 trillion to the national debt for tax cuts for the 1 percent? No problem. After all, he didn’t even pay any taxes for eight years, possibly longer.

Now, he is claiming that Congress has no right to information to which he already had waived privilege. Now he is saying the entire Mueller report (paid for by the American people) on Russian manipulation of American voters is secret. No congressional oversight. No cooperation with Congress — unless it is controlled by wimpy Republicans who back the immoral Trump at every turn, members who then go home and make a big show of going to church. Yecch.

This is Trump’s strategy, carelessly revealed by those same wimps. Goad the House Democrats into impeaching Trump for obstruction of justice among other high crimes and misdemeanors. But, then, the Senate, controlled by Republicans, will refuse to convict Trump, who will then run for re-election in 2020.

And maybe, if Democrats can’t get their act together — a strong possibility — he wins a second term and destroys the country by setting the precedent that presidents are above the rule of law.

He starts trade wars. He alienates our allies. He gives comfort to murderers and dictators. He separates children from their parents, without adequate paperwork so they can’t be reunited. He deregulates business so heavily that conglomerates rule everything. He surrounds himself with loyalists who do his bidding at the expense of the country. He increases the divide between the haves and the have-nots. He refuses to pay for natural disasters. He foments racial hate and intolerance. He bullies.

Most of all, he destroys the idea of America as a shining city on the hill, moral and wise arbiter, reliable partner, defender of human rights.

Trump has convinced millions of Americans that his chaos, scoffing at laws and disregard for the separation of powers is the new normal, that autocracy is not so bad if the economy is growing and the stock market is on a roll. And Trump has convinced millions not to believe in the institutions a democracy depends on, such as a free press and the Constitution.

Most of these issues will be decided in the courts, which, of course, is exactly why Trump is stuffing the courts with his people — judges who will serve for life.

There is a lot to be said for bromides, as in “power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Let’s not get lost in Trump’s swamp. Let’s remember what is important to us — freedom, decency, honesty, knowledge, kindness, fairness, know-how and a can-do spirit.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has good instincts. She understands that impeaching Trump would play into his self-promoting, self-marketing hands — he would cry that he was railroaded, that he is a victim. When she says Trump is “self-impeachable,” she is saying that Trump is doing enough damage to his presidency all by himself. Let him have at it.

There is one way to get out of this mess, one way for us to reclaim the country. Don’t re-elect Donald Trump. Seven hundred prosecutors signed on to a letter stating that if Trump were not president, he would be charged with obstruction of justice, a felony.

Well, someday, he won’t be in office; let’s work to see that justice then will be done.